Hi everyone, I’m looking to get a video doorbell which is blocked from cloud access, connected instead to a local NVR but without losing remote view completely - I’m not new to CCTV or smart homes, but I am to Homey, so I just wanted to get some recommendations on specific integrations.
I assume any of the Reolink/Eufy types would connect to an NVR (Or something like Synology Surveillance Station) as long as they support ONVIF or if it’s their own brand NVR. I want the doorbell press to a) ring a local chime (I assume this would work regardless) and b) trigger a routine in Homey - Not sure this would be supported in an NVR so presumably Homey will have to connect direct to the doorbell?
I then want that routine to send push notifications to mobile phones to allow the mobile to connect to the video stream from the NVR, not from the Doorbell camera.
Has anyone done anything similar and have any particular recommendations or pitfalls to specific brands?
Eufy cameras work great in Homey. They record locally to your HomeBase, so you don’t have any recurring fees. There’s also local AI detections, so you don’t have to pay for those either. I currently only have the Solar Wall Light Cam but I’m also installing a Eufy doorbell soon.
I have Reolink PoE doorbell connected directly to an NVR, via PoE switch
I have a doorbell chime also (part of a bundle)
I have a few reolink cameras, so that is why I went with this doorbell
It works as its supposed to in the reolink app, as does the chime
Throw Homey into the mix, I do the following:
When doorbell is pressed, send a whatsapp group a ‘snapshot’ (still image only) So I can instantly see who is there - this is also what the app does, but within the app you can enable two way audio and talk to the person as any video doorbell. I didnt find a way to do this is Homey, so I just use the reolink app if I want to talk to whoever turns up because that also notifies me
The chime works anyway, but I have also set up Alexa to announce that someone is at the door
Apps required for Homey:
Reolink
Whatsapp (group) - add your other house members
Alexa
Other things I played with, but havent got a permanent flow for:
On motion detect, send snapshot of what is there to my whatsapp group - resulted in loads of false positives, so took it off
On motion, and if its dark turn on spotlight (another Reolink camera that overlooks entire driveway)
the idea here was to provide light, but I found I could do that with any light, and the amount of false positives using the doorbell meant my light was like a disco all night
So in summary, it does all you require and then some. Perhaps the exception is viewing the doorbells video through a Homey flow as there are only cards for ‘snapshot’ which is just a still image - unless you can find an ONVIF type app and use that somehow? (doorbell has ONVIF as I had it into Frigate at one point)
Reolink wifi 12V powered doorbell + chime - connected directly to HA & Homey per Onvif integration/app. SD card for offline recordings.
It’s all local only, I blocked all related DNS requests and all’s working.
I don’t get the “local AND remote” part by the way.
When I want to check live cam footage, I use my VPN to connect to my LAN
Why would you want to block internet access to a device? I get why you might not want to pay for cloud storage, but I don’t understand why you would want to block the connection altogether. The device then doesn’t receive any (security updates, which can be risky (to use on your main network at least). You also won’t be able to change configuration of the device (that works via the cloud, right?)
I temporary allow internet when needed, for the occasional update.
I just don’t like devices, especially cams, trying to connect (and send data I didn’t allow) to god knows what.
Configuration and image viewing/storing is all done via LAN, Sven. Otherwise I wouldn’t even consider buying it.
From many of your other posts I see you trust cloud (companies) 100%, but I just really don’t.
Yes, but most don’t allow updating from a file (none that I’ve seen at least, except for the very old cameras which didn’t even have any mobile app yet). So you can manually click “Check for updates” (in Eufy and Tapo at least, don’t know about other brands) and manually update from the server, but it does need cloud connectivity for that (I think the P2P video stream can be blocked though, likely only signaling channel and OTA server are needed for that, but I’m not sure since I allow everything to access the internet unrestricted).
Thanks for all of the previous replies. I’ve had to eliminate Eufy as it appears the HomeBase doesn’t (as far as I can tell) allow adding generic cameras and they no longer seem to sell standard PoE external cameras, they’re all Solar powered (which is great if you need it, not if you don’t!)
Has anyone integrated Homey with any more traditional CCTV systems like Dahua or Hik?
Hi Peter, sorry for the late reply. Yes, VPN is exactly why I want it all local only, so the notification is sent to their mobile and they can then view the streams from any camera, not just the doorbell (and importantly this is an actual live stream, not the sometimes delayed view from some web service as can happen)
Often, camera connections only use a server connection once and then open a P2P (direct) video stream. Almost every camera uses P2P nowadays, so as long as your ISP supports it (so no cgNAT or double NAT/multiple routers daisy-chained), then the camera stream will have much lower latency. If you use a mobile network or Starlink, this might not work since then it will fall back to the TURN server.
But every cam I know of needs at least some kind of server to communicate with, either for updates, configuration or the entire stream. If you want a truly local-only camera, you should look at the commercial/enterprise solutions like Axis or Foscam, though these usually come with a high pricetag
Their doorbell C31 supports both battery and regular doorbell wiring AFAIK
If you are looking for a camera also, Tapo cams are also pretty good. They’re cheap, can record to an SD card as well. They are supported on a Homey Pro 2023 or 2026. In my case, I use a Pro 2019 so I can’t connect them to Homey but the Tapo mobile app works good enough for me. Note that their battery cameras don’t support RTSP or ONVIF, so these aren’t compatible
I’m aware. When I refer to delays, the issues with e.g. Ring are that the notifications take so long to come through that the event has already passed long before the stream is opened. I’m taking care of the notifications by having the Smart Home system deliver them directly, but I would be concerned about how long their system takes to initiate the P2P connection - I’ve not used the system directly to know if this is actually an issue, or if the delays are only down to the notification.
I was talking about their regular CCTV cameras - although I have now seen that they do still have PoE cameras, it seems these are only compatible with their S4 NVR, not HomeBase - I’ll be honest, their website is terrible, which isn’t helping.
I’ve found that Dahua do have a doorbell so I might stick with that.
Why does it need to have PoE? Is regular wiring (USB or mains, used by most cameras) not available? AFAIK the only cameras with PoE are enterprise solutions, since you usually wouldn’t have PoE in a residential environment anyway.
For the P2P stream, it takes 4 seconds to wake the battery camera and open the stream with Eufy on both WiFi and cellular. It might be faster with a powered Eufy cam, though. Note that this is measured from tapping the device tile in the app, until the stream is playing
On Tapo, notifications take 3 seconds. On Eufy, they take around 6 seconds.
On the Tapo app (C200 camera, mains powered), it takes 1 second to load on WiFi and 2 seconds to load on cellular. Environment: Zyxel Nebula NWA110BE (WiFi 7) AP, Galaxy S24FE (WiFi 6E), 5G cellular connection, fiber internet connection with 200mbits download and 300mbits upload.
The results can vary a lot, based on several different factors (internet speeds, connection quality, signal strength, how close you are to a TURN server from Tapo/Eufy in case of a mobile connection etc.) so only way to know is to test it yourself.
If you need me to test anything else on Tapo or Eufy, please let me know!
